In 14 years of Wordsmith.org, last week was singular in the volume of angry
email from readers. They were upset that we had given a platform to a veg
advocate. Some sent thoughtful notes, while others made snide remarks;
still others canceled their subscriptions.

Food is something so personal, such an intimate part of our lives, that any
comment upon it, especially something that appears to question it, makes
us wince. The discomfort displayed in those notes is understandable.

I felt similar discomfort 12 years ago and decided to go vegan after
reading literature from Vegan Outreach, an organization co-founded by
Matt Ball. I thank him for being a Guest Wordsmith here last week, and
thank you for taking the time to write and letting us know how you feel.

From: Soni Pitts (soni sonipitts.com)
Subject: Re: Vegetarian theme

I'm wondering if you'll get any pushback on this week's theme, along the
lines of "using your platform to preach".

I want you to know that at least some of us out here on the other end of the
send button managed to splutter on past our indignation and into reasoned
acceptance on this issue at some point and in some manner. (I'm afraid it
was my youngest sister who caught the brunt of my own cognitively dissonant
wrath, before her arguments convinced me that loving animals and paying
others to torture them to death for my lunch were at odds. I have since
apologized.)

For those who want to know more about factory farming, check out this
award-winning expose of corporate farming techniques and consequences, The Meatrix (based on the movie The Matrix).

From: Elsa Kramer (efk earthlink.net)
Subject: factory farming

Factory farms are actually AFOs, Animal Feeding Operations. According to the
EPA definition, they are lots or facilities where "(1) animals have been,
are, or will be stabled or confined and fed or maintained for a total of 45
days or more in a 12-month period; and (2) where crops, vegetation, forage
growth, or post harvest residues are not sustained in the normal growing
season over any portion of the lot or facility."

An AFO is designated as a Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO)
"based on the number of animals at the facility and/or whether the facility
discharges to waters of the United States."

Thus, not all factory farms are CAFOs, but they are all AFOs and definitely
worthy of our attention, as both reflect the potential problems of cruelty
to animals as well as the impact of discharged animal waste on our planet.

Speciesism - what a wonderful word that brings up such a poignant and
pertinent issue today! I would like to take a moment to comment, however,
that the quotation provided is an excellent but unfortunate example of
hagiography.

Although it is true that Darwin objected to the violent treatment of slaves,
Darwin maintained that various races evolved at different times and rates,
thus some were evolutionarily inferior to others. For instance, he stated
that the break in evolutionary history between apes and humans fell "between
the negro or Australian and the gorilla", and he expressed his hope that in
the near future civilised races would "exterminate and replace the savage
races" so that the gap would be larger, such as between "the Caucasian and
some ape as low as the baboon" (The Descent of Man, 1874, p.178). In the
same book he often affirms that natural selection had produced significant
differences in the mental faculties of "men of distinct races" (pp. 109-110,
160, 201, 216).

Although Descartes did believe that non-human animals were automata who had
no thoughts or feelings, the most common meaning of the noun Cartesian is
one who believes in strict mind-body dualism. The adjectival form, as your
grim example shows, well expresses the assumptions behind today's "factory
farming" and meat "processing".

Within mathematics Descartes did a great deal, but his name is most often
used as the adjective in "cartesian coordinates". That refers to the way we
graph things with one set of numbers labeled along one (usually horizontal)
line and another along a line at right angles to the first (so they can also
be called rectilinear coordinates, but cartesian seems to be used far more
often) and associate pairs of numbers with points in the plane that contains
those two lines. (When I was younger, cartesian was usually written with an
upper-case C, but such formality seems to have disappeared now.)

By using this scheme Descartes made it possible to connect geometry and
algebra or arithmetic. The power of this connection in solving problems in
both fields has been enormous. He did a lot of other things that come up in
a History of Mathematics class, but this is where a typical student hears
his name.

I love this word. I think in order to have loving compassion you have to
challenge yourself to connect on some level. In any cases I've come across
in reading, news, or in life -- when people are not compassionate they
have become disconnected or purposely make themselves that way in order
to justify their behavior.